This invention relates to a garment for an incontinent person, such as a toddler or a child who has learned to walk but has not yet become toilet trained. The garment includes training pants or briefs usually worn as an undergarment about the lower abdomen and a disposable absorbent liner supported in the briefs for receiving and holding body urine and excrement.
During the early years of a child""s life, when the child is capable of walking, but has not yet become toilet trained, is mobile, social and somewhat communicative, the child is capable of various social functions so, therefore, travels with parents or other responsible adults. Typically, the child travels away from the home in an automobile to various locations, such as to other homes, but also to uncontrolled social environments, such as to a grocery store, to restaurants, to public events and to nursery schools. During these activities, it is not unusual for the toddler to have a bowel movement or urinate.
Typically, the child is dressed in an undergarment, with liquid impervious briefs worn about the outside of the garment, with other external clothing, such as overalls, pants or a dress worn outside the briefs. When the undergarments of a toddler must be changed, the typical situation is that the lower clothing must be completely removed from the lower abdomen of the child in order to gain access to the undergarments and replace them.
A typical diaper still in use today comprises a rectangular-shaped cotton reusable diaper which is usually folded into somewhat of a triangular shape, and is arranged to encircle the waist of the infant or toddler while extending through the crotch area. The newer, more popular diaper for infants or small children is the disposable diaper which has the typical xe2x80x9cwing,xe2x80x9d flat design and is form fitted so as to fasten about the waist of the child, forming leg openings, and providing absorbent material adjacent the lower abdomen of the child while providing a liquid impervious outer layer to block liquids from escaping from the diaper.
Products available in the market for the toilet training cycle of a toddler or a small child include regular cotton reusable garments, or disposable training garments. These products have not met the needs of the consumer during the xe2x80x9cin-betweenxe2x80x9d stages. Most parents use a combination of all of the above mentioned products, but all methods available in the market today are messy, or frustrating to the toddler and to the parent when a xe2x80x9cdiaper changexe2x80x9d is made. Some of these products are extremely expensive.
The cotton reusable products offered in the market require the toddler or small child to wear a hot, uncomfortable vinyl pant to protect the other clothing from being soiled. If the toddler or small child has problems with irritation, and is sensitive to the vinyl pant, it can cause skin rashes. When this occurs, the parent is forced to use the cotton training pant alone; causing messy accidents, additional soiled clothing, and making it impossible to remove the undergarment without smearing body excrement everywhere. Adequate xe2x80x9ccleanupxe2x80x9d is almost impossible in a public facility. The child may become traumatized by the excrement removal procedure, causing him to regress in the training process. When this happens, it ruins the pleasure of taking the child outside the home for fun and recreation. In order to remove the reusable product from the toddler and change into a clean garment, all clothing must be removed from the toddler from the waist down.
Eliminating unnecessary stress to the toddler during the, changing and cleanup process of the toilet training phase is very important. When trauma is eliminated, the toddler or small child is more likely to relax, and the toilet training program is likely to be more rewarding for both parent and child.
The disposable products currently on the market for toddler or small children make xe2x80x9cclean-upxe2x80x9d easier, however, changing to a clean garment, as described above, is extremely bothersome and time consuming. Some products feature the rip-away side system to remove the garment. With these products, however, it is necessary to undress the child from the waist down to change to a new garment.
While the crotch area of a diaper or training pant typically receives all of the excrement and urine emitted from the toddler, there are other areas that are unused for the absorption and collection process, and are used primarily only to hold the diaper in place. For example, the area of the garment about the waist, the hips and the upper portion of the buttocks are often unsoiled during diaper use, and when it is removed and discarded, a substantial amount of unused material is discarded, and must be disposed of along with the other, used areas of the diaper or training pant. Further, the provision of such large diapers or training pants, a portion of each which is not used for absorption and collection purposes, requires the undergarment to be larger and more expensive to produce, and more expensive to dispose of than would be a product of the size and shape necessary only to collect and contain the excrement of the toddler.
While the foregoing undergarment changing procedure for a child generally has become accepted as necessary in today""s society, there still is a need for a more expedient method of changing the absorbent garment of a small child, without unnecessary use and waste of materials and without the requirement of removing so many garments from the toddler or small child in the change-over process.
The new invention, the disposable or reusable garment with the disposable liner/diaper, is constructed in an effort to meet all of the objectives. This product is designed to open at the lower front abdomen section of the garment gaining access to an open crotch for two reasons. First, there is an optional disposable liner/diaper that can be used for added protection. It can be removed and replace without having to remove the garment. Second, a new garment can be changed, if necessary. Using the optional disposable liner/diaper in conjunction with the disposable or reusable garment will give the ability to minimize diaper or training pant waste, and will reduce the cost of expensive disposable garments.
The universal disposable liner/diaper is unique in that it will fit into the training pants described herein, and can also be worn in any regular toddler""s or children""s undergarment, infant diaper cover, or on the inside of a conventional cloth diaper. The wear and tear on conventional cloth diaper or cloth garments will be substantially decreased, and the cost of garment replacement will decrease.
It is the purpose of this invention to provide a more healthy, sanitary, user-friendly environment for both the parents and the child in one of the most demanding, but natural stages of the child""s life. It is also our intention to give the consumer, at all income levels, the opportunity to afford a training system that can meet their needs, without sacrificing the features of the invention capabilities.
Briefly described, the present invention comprises a disposable or reusable garment in the form of training pants or briefs with a disposable liner that is suitable for use by an incontinent person, such as a child in its early years during its toilet training phase. The invention includes a garment featuring a lower front separating system which receives an absorbent liner that functions as a diaper, and the garment can be opened without removal of the garment from about the waist of the toddler while removing the soiled liner and its contents, and placing a fresh liner in the garment.
The garment is absorbent and is applied to the lower abdomen of a person and includes a reusable undergarment and a replaceable absorbent disposable liner/diaper. The reusable undergarment includes a continuous waistband structure adapted to completely encircle a waist of the person, the waistband structure having an inside surface for facing the person, and having a back segment, a top front segment and opposed side segments. A releasable panel extends from the back segment of the waistband structure and forms a crotch segment for extending about the crotch of a person, and a front abdominal segment extends from the crotch segment toward the top front segment of the waistband structure and has an upper end portion having an outside surface for placement in underlying engagement with the inside surface of the top front segment of the waistband structure.
Pressure sensitive connectors extend along the outside surface of the upper end portion of said front abdominal segment of said releasable panel and along the inside surface of the top front panel of the waistband structure for releasably connecting the upper end portion of the front abdominal segment of the releasable panel to the inside surface of the top front segment of the waistband structure to form leg openings of the garment.
The absorbent disposable liner/diaper includes a liquid impermeable outer layer of sheet material for placement facing the releasable panel of said undergarment, a liquid permeable outer layer of sheet material opposed to said liquid impermeable outer layer of sheet material for placement facing the person, and intermediate layers of liquid absorbent material confined between said outer layers of sheet material.
The absorbent disposable liner/diaper is in the shape of an approximate hourglass with a narrow intermediate crotch portion sized for placement adjacent the crotch segment of the releasable panel and opposed end portions wider than the intermediate crotch portion sized for placement adjacent the back segment and the front abdominal segment of the releasable panel. The absorbent disposable liner/diaper is of a length sufficient to extend from the back segment of the waistband structure to the upper end portion of the releasable panel, and is supported by said releasable panel and is releasable with said releasable panel with respect to said top front segment of the waistband structure.
The liner/diaper is directly supported by the releasable panel so that the liner/diaper is movable with said releasable panel such that the liner/diaper and panel are adapted to move toward and away from the crotch of the person.
When the garment is worn by a person, the front abdominal segment of the releasable panel can be released from the top front segment of the waistband structure to open the front abdominal segment and crotch segment of the releasable panel and the disposable liner/diaper can be moved with the front abdominal segment to expose the crotch of a person and the disposable liner/diaper can be removed from the undergarment and another duplicate disposable liner/diaper can be inserted into position in the undergarment and connected to the releasable panel and the front segment reconnected to the top front segment of the undergarment, without removing the undergarment from the person.
Thus, it is the objective of this invention to provide an improved garment for a child to use which absorbs and contains the excrement of the child, while providing quick removal, clean up, and replacement of a new liner/diaper during the toilet training phase.